Tag: localism

A Defense of College Football Rivalries as Local Culture

College football is a local endeavor that should be enacted by those with a connection to that place.

Fighting Loneliness and Polarization with Chili

I am not sure if Garfield ever made chili for his supporters. The men and women who descended on his property were there to meet a future president. What Garfield understood, however, is that home is the best place to begin a movement.

Shopping Local in a Storm

I mourn the storm. It’s far from over. But I also do not mourn without hope.

The Liberal Charity Model

Our need for privacy has been accentuated by the way we live, in which goods and services arrive seemingly out of the ether, things we’ve bought to consume, throw away, or do with what we wish. The faces and hands behind these goods are invisible to us.

Belonging to the Garden

I belong to this place—if not for the next thousand years, at least for the summer. In such a displaced age, even that has to mean something.

What Plays in Peoria

You don’t have to be normal. You don’t have to be weird. You just have to be a person – which is a moral ideal, not a fact of nature – and let the chips fall.

Real Communities and Democratic Theory

If we don’t experience full, unqualified “concrete, historical community,” then we won’t experience full, unqualified “genuine deliberation.”

The Uglification of Michigan Lake Towns

America is known for its English-Protestant roots, for the pilgrims who settled the Eastern seaboard and the Anglos who descended from them. But America has a French-Catholic history, too, and Northern Michigan is a central location in that history.

Boom Towns Go Bust

Civil society relies on common spaces where people of all backgrounds can meet, but states and cities have been pursuing semi-privatization of public spaces.

Remembering Family History: A Mess, a Murderer, and a Matriarch

Knowing your family’s past fugitives and pretty boys is the kind of localism anyone can aspire toward and practice.